Click of death on my external HDD

[MaxDSP]

Absolutely blows. This is a 186 GB external Fantom casing with a WD EIDE disk inside. I know...I should have been backing everything up on it, but this IS the backup drive!

For the past 10 years or so I've been able to transfer old stuff to new computers and new drives, so the majority of that stuff is now on this drive, which I only bought and started using about 3.5 years ago. I started transferring all my data to it as a central storage spot, but I also started using it as a live destination for new downloads, music, backups, etc.

I've used R-Studio in the past to recover data from corrupt drives, but they didn't give off any physical/audible signs of failure. This drive however, keeps clicking, and cant see it in Windows or computer management. The stupid thing is that I was actually shopping around for 1 TB drives since this one was getting full, and it decides to crap out now.

Is there any hope for this drive at all?

 

[gsellis]

Ow. Besides using a freezer bag to keep moisture out, the only thing I can offer is:

Get a small braiser and burn some floppy disks in it in front of the drive as both a sacrifice to the data 'gods' and as a veiled threat to the bad drive for what happens to useless magnetic media.

 

[Denithor]

Slight modification to the "freezer treatment" - do your data grab with the drive still in the freezer.

As in, freeze overnight in a ziplock bag, pull it out just long enough to hook up cables, put back in the freezer with the cables trailing out through the rubber stopper on the door. Plug into a laptop & try to recover your files.

This has helped me on a couple of hdds but not all.

If you have no luck with that method, Blain always pushes SpinRite 6.0 as a solution. Might be worth a try (unfortunately they have no trial options, but anyway...).

 

[MaxDSP]

OK, took the drive to work and hooked it up inside a pc to the EIDE cable. The HDD does not click when it is hooked up this way internally. It wasn't plug and play, but coworker did a firmware upgrade on it, at which point i saw the directories displayed on the drive. However, as I prepared to copy my files off it, it started flaking out (still no clicking). Rebooted the machine but even during POST it took forever, and it failed to recognize the drive was attached to the PATA port.

Once we were in windows, everytime we went to My Computer, the pc was freezing, as it seemed like it was trying to access the drive. Eventually it showed up in compmgmt, but I couldnt browse through it with explorer. It was time to leave by then, so bought the drive home.

You guys think Spinrite would help in this case?

 

[Denithor]

Try the freezer trick first if you haven't. Then I would suggest a PM to Blain for why he pushes that software so much in cases like these.